Commentary and analysis to persuade people to become socialist and to act for themselves, organizing democratically and without leaders, to bring about a world of common ownership and free access. We are solely concerned with building a movement of socialists for socialism. We are not reformists with a programme of policies to patch up capitalism.

Tuesday, May 27, 2014

Desperate For School

DOYABA/SIDDHO/N’DJAMENA, 26 May 2014 (IRIN) -

Some 40,900 children and
thousands more youths displaced by the violence in the Central African
Republic (CAR) are stuck in transit camps in southern Chad with no
formal school to attend, few to no training opportunities, and no jobs,
leaving them with no sense of what the future will bring.

“There is nothing to do here - we do nothing all day,” said Ibrahim
Oumar, 25, in Doyaba transit camp near Sarh, which houses mainly Chadian
returnees from CAR, many of them born in CAR. Oumar studied finance at
college. “I’d do anything I could work-wise. One day I’ll return [to
Bangui] to finish.”

Abdou Aziz Tarik, 17, from the CAR capital Bangui, told IRIN: “With
school you can do something. Without it you’ll achieve nothing.”

Displaced teachers have set up informal schools in some sites. For
instance, in Doyaba transit camp, they set up a school in which 3,200
primary and pre-school children have enrolled. But none cater for the
needs of secondary school students. Some 4,000 of the displaced children
have been relocated to pre-existing schools but as yet no children are
being formally educated in camps, according to the UN Children’s Fund
(UNICEF).

Some 97,000 refugees and returnees have fled CAR over 2013 and 2014 seeking safety in Chad, according to the UN Refugee Agency.